Women's team - what do we need to step up in 22/23

jojojo

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Who would you like to see get a new contract?

What positions do we do need to fill and what positions do we need more depth?

Any suggestions on who/where we're going to find the players.

What about the rest of the setup: the training ground, the support staff, the marketing etc?
 

DomesticTadpole

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A striker and another CB, definitely more firepower. Depends who is here for next season. It is likely lack of goals that will cost us CL football.
 

MUW4Eva

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Well with Mannion out for likely most, if not all of next season, we could do with another CB to replace her sadly.

With Bruun going back to Lyon, she won't exactly be a miss, as she has sadly been a dud, she has spent more time out injured than she has playing minutes.

If we are not to bring up Solskjaer or Edwards from the youth team (we definitely should, but my faith in Skinner with regards to using the youth players, is practically zero or non existant sadly), then that leaves us with just Thomas and Russo, so we could do with another striker in that regard to put pressure on Russo.

I have no idea what we are doing with Fuso, she just seems to never play, nor what kind of role we are expecting her to play in those few minutes that she sometimes/hardly ever gets, so probably best to move her on.

We could also do with two extra wide players, one on the left, and one on the right, or one extra player, who is capable of playing as well on either side, as we only have Galton on the left and Hanson on the right, for those specific sort of roles/positions.

Then there is the bigger question over player contracts, with Millie Turner, Ona, Jackie, Staniforth and Russo, all seemingly having their contracts run out this summer, we need to get as many, if not all of them to sign long term deals, or if they don't want a long term deal, then at least another season long deal.
If any or all of them do leave, then that will mean that we will need to replace them, and that will not be an easy task at all.

So our summer could be hugely dictated by not only if by some miracle that we qualify for the Champions League (we won't), but also how many of those contracts we can get signed up again.
Leaving as many vital players to have their deals all run out at the same time, is very irresponsible, and does show a severe lack of care by those at the club, it is just one more reason why we desperately need a Director of Football specifically dedicated to the women's team, so that situations like this don't crop up again.

In terms of potential signings, I would love for us to sign Le Tiss, and to make a couple of really big statement signings, as if we keep on signing players that other clubs are happy to sell, or are not THAT bothered to see leave, then we will not challenge for the top 3 positions.
We need to make some signings that really make the other "big 3" sides sit up and take notice.

That will be very hard to do without Champions League football to offer them of course, so we will have to get "creative" to try to tempt them to come to us, use everything that we can, for example, why not tap into RvP to try to convince Viv to make the same move that he did? Her contract is expiring in the summer, she hasn't signed a new deal with Arsenal, so if we can use RvP to convince her to join us, then why not do just that?
It might not work, we used Eric Cantona and Sir Alex to try to tempt Bellingham before he joined Dortmund, but at least it would look as if we are trying to sign the very best around.

So this summer is a huge one for the women's team, there is so much potential there for us if we can have a big summer, and get things right, but if not......then it will be 4th again, for the 4th season running, and that is just beginning to become very irksome and tiresome.
 
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FrankDrebin

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Question, are the woman's team still training at the dated, eyesore that is the Cliff ?
 

MUW4Eva

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Question, are the woman's team still training at the dated, eyesore that is the Cliff ?
No, I don't believe that they have trained there all that often, perhaps once or twice, their regular training base is at Leigh Sports Village, and sometimes they use Carrington, not sure where you are thinking they train at The Cliff, with full respect.
 

DomesticTadpole

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No, I don't believe that they have trained there all that often, perhaps once or twice, their regular training base is at Leigh Sports Village, and sometimes they use Carrington, not sure where you are thinking they train at The Cliff, with full respect.
That supposedly was one of the reason for the fallout with Casey Stoney, that we had not pushed on with plans to include the women's training at Carrington or that the men had good facilities and the women were using port-a-cabins for changing and did not have proper shower and toilet facilities.
 

jojojo

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Yep, the promised upgraded Cliff (that was supposed to be ready "in a few months") never happened. The training facilities at LSV were never "ours" - they were either shared with public facilities or with Leigh RL - and the setup got worse during covid.

They moved to Carrington - initially without a proper gym, showers, physio area etc. I've read it's better this season, but I think it's still a collection of temporary arrangements rather than a proper base.
 

phelans shorts

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A striker and another CB, definitely more firepower. Depends who is here for next season. It is likely lack of goals that will cost us CL football.
I’d definitely go along with those being the glaring. I had hoped Bruun would fill the need up front but it really hasn’t worked so far. Ideally somebody to compete with/rotate with Galton too
 

jojojo

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It's been a real shame about Bruun. If she'd been fully fit and firing, she could have been the difference between making/not making the CL places. If we had made the CL, then it did sound like we had a chance of keeping her. Double hit there really.

We knew coming into the season that the squad was thin - at centreback and striker in particular. We've paid a pretty high price for that in terms of results. I think we'll need two more centre backs for next season - though I guess one of them could be a loan or a short contract player (to cover Mannion's absence). A big recruitment challenge though.
 

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Well with Mannion out for likely most, if not all of next season, we could do with another CB to replace her sadly.

With Bruun going back to Lyon, she won't exactly be a miss, as she has sadly been a dud, she has spent more time out injured than she has playing minutes.

If we are not to bring up Solskjaer or Edwards from the youth team (we definitely should, but my faith in Skinner with regards to using the youth players, is practically zero or non existant sadly), then that leaves us with just Thomas and Russo, so we could do with another striker in that regard to put pressure on Russo.

I have no idea what we are doing with Fuso, she just seems to never play, nor what kind of role we are expecting her to play in those few minutes that she sometimes/hardly ever gets, so probably best to move her on.

We could also do with two extra wide players, one on the left, and one on the right, or one extra player, who is capable of playing as well on either side, as we only have Galton on the left and Hanson on the right, for those specific sort of roles/positions.

Then there is the bigger question over player contracts, with Millie Turner, Ona, Jackie, Staniforth and Russo, all seemingly having their contracts run out this summer, we need to get as many, if not all of them to sign long term deals, or if they don't want a long term deal, then at least another season long deal.
If any or all of them do leave, then that will mean that we will need to replace them, and that will not be an easy task at all.

So our summer could be hugely dictated by not only if by some miracle that we qualify for the Champions League (we won't), but also how many of those contracts we can get signed up again.
Leaving as many vital players to have their deals all run out at the same time, is very irresponsible, and does show a severe lack of care by those at the club, it is just one more reason why we desperately need a Director of Football specifically dedicated to the women's team, so that situations like this don't crop up again.

In terms of potential signings, I would love for us to sign Le Tiss, and to make a couple of really big statement signings, as if we keep on signing players that other clubs are happy to sell, or are not THAT bothered to see leave, then we will not challenge for the top 3 positions.
We need to make some signings that really make the other "big 3" sides sit up and take notice.

That will be very hard to do without Champions League football to offer them of course, so we will have to get "creative" to try to tempt them to come to us, use everything that we can, for example, why not tap into RvP to try to convince Viv to make the same move that he did? Her contract is expiring in the summer, she hasn't signed a new deal with Arsenal, so if we can use RvP to convince her to join us, then why not do just that?
It might not work, we used Eric Cantona and Sir Alex to try to tempt Bellingham before he joined Dortmund, but at least it would look as if we are trying to sign the very best around.

So this summer is a huge one for the women's team, there is so much potential there for us if we can have a big summer, and get things right, but if not......then it will be 4th again, for the 4th season running, and that is just beginning to become very irksome and tiresome.
Lots of good points there.

Battle, Groenen and Russo are looks important to me, I hope Millie Turner will return to normal too.

I think depth in defence and attack is vital for a league push (as evidenced by this season). At the same time, the jump up to Chelsea, City and Arsenal is so big that if we shall hope to challenge them un a normal season, we need to improve some first choice positions as well. That is a tricky question, because if you look at the three or four standout players of that lot, how many players do we really have at that level. Ella Toone?

So the challenge is to identify players at that level (or at the brink of it) who wants to come to us even wwithout CL.

At wich point, it would help if they don’t have to piss in a bucket when we give them the grand tour to sell in our facilities as proof that we are a club aiming for the top.
 

MUW4Eva

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It's been a real shame about Bruun. If she'd been fully fit and firing, she could have been the difference between making/not making the CL places. If we had made the CL, then it did sound like we had a chance of keeping her. Double hit there really.

We knew coming into the season that the squad was thin - at centreback and striker in particular. We've paid a pretty high price for that in terms of results. I think we'll need two more centre backs for next season - though I guess one of them could be a loan or a short contract player (to cover Mannion's absence). A big recruitment challenge though.
We needed Bruun to have the same, or even a bigger impact, that Blackstenius has had for Arsenal, instead we got seemingly the female Phil Jones, in terms of the amount of time spent out injured.

She probably is a quality player, but we just haven't seen it, we even displayed Russo away to City (pushed her out wide) to accompany playing Bruun through the middle, boy did that not work out well sadly for all concerned.

She has been a duff signing, we would have been just a well off playing Edwards or Karna, as they would have at the very least, remained fit and available for games.

This summer is a huge one, it will tell us an awful lot about just how the club views the women's team.
If we spend a similar amount, no pushing the boat out financially, or anything like that, then e shall know that they are happy just pottering along in 4th place, with no ambition of getting a Champions League place.

As only by really going all out, using every available tool and more, (say using RvP to try to convince Viv to follow the same path he took, and paying her very handsomely) will we even stand a remote chance of pushing for a top 3 place.
Why not look at the recent Nxtgen list of young and very talented players, and try to get one or two of them at club (yeah I get Brexit rules can be a bit of an annoyance/hindrance)?
Just think out of the box a bit, rather than just who we can get from other WSL sides,or who Skinner has previously worked with in Orlando (although I wouldn't sniff at Marta, or bringing back Amy Turner! ).


I hope it is far more the latter, than the former, in terms of really pushing the boat out, as it would be great/amazing/unbelievable to get a Champions League place.
 

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Of the list of players above - Millie Turner, Ona, Jackie, Staniforth and Russo. All actually have +1s in their contracts except Staniforth (Jackie mentioned it in a dutch interview, the others are in their signing/renewing info).

Their base at Carrington, although it appears to be in basically fancy portacabins, it is fitted out specific for them. You can see it in some of the teams socials. It's fully branded, appears to include their own recovery room, canteen etc and they're still in the infamous tent of their gym but tbh it does look to be a very fancy one.

They've trained at Carrington since Jan 2021, but their area has been there basically all year. You can also see it on some of the mens youth games.

It's far from perfect, and hopefully these new pitches will end up being next to an expansion of the Carrington complex that'll include a permanent building for them.

Re players from Pride. Well as usually Pride are a complete shambles again this year, they've got a load of injuries, they've lost almost all their previous major players (Harris, Krieger, Morgan, Riley) and Marta is out of the season. Leroux is basically on her own now. For reasons unknown the new coach hasn't really been starting Amy T (even though they lost 3 of the their back 5 from last year) but her fiancee Haz James now plays for them as well so I think it's unlikely she'll be back in WSL for awhile but who knows. The turnover of the team has been massive since last year, but it may be worth looking at the players Skinner signed for them. Moore has already been picked up from there.

I do think that if Viv goes Arsenal will struggle to replace her goals. Foord also is out of contract and their coach seemed to be very clear that he really wanted her to stay but nothings signed yet. I don't think Stina will score anywhere near that many next year, but Meads form has been impressive.

There are work permit issues, but if a team like WHU can get Hasegawa it shows that plenty of internationals will come.
 

MUW4Eva

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Of the list of players above - Millie Turner, Ona, Jackie, Staniforth and Russo. All actually have +1s in their contracts except Staniforth (Jackie mentioned it in a dutch interview, the others are in their signing/renewing info).

Their base at Carrington, although it appears to be in basically fancy portacabins, it is fitted out specific for them. You can see it in some of the teams socials. It's fully branded, appears to include their own recovery room, canteen etc and they're still in the infamous tent of their gym but tbh it does look to be a very fancy one.

They've trained at Carrington since Jan 2021, but their area has been there basically all year. You can also see it on some of the mens youth games.

It's far from perfect, and hopefully these new pitches will end up being next to an expansion of the Carrington complex that'll include a permanent building for them.

Re players from Pride. Well as usually Pride are a complete shambles again this year, they've got a load of injuries, they've lost almost all their previous major players (Harris, Krieger, Morgan, Riley) and Marta is out of the season. Leroux is basically on her own now. For reasons unknown the new coach hasn't really been starting Amy T (even though they lost 3 of the their back 5 from last year) but her fiancee Haz James now plays for them as well so I think it's unlikely she'll be back in WSL for awhile but who knows. The turnover of the team has been massive since last year, but it may be worth looking at the players Skinner signed for them. Moore has already been picked up from there.

I do think that if Viv goes Arsenal will struggle to replace her goals. Foord also is out of contract and their coach seemed to be very clear that he really wanted her to stay but nothings signed yet. I don't think Stina will score anywhere near that many next year, but Meads form has been impressive.

There are work permit issues, but if a team like WHU can get Hasegawa it shows that plenty of internationals will come.
Wasn't Hasegawa signed before Brexit happened or at the very least, the full powers of it coming into force??

I could be wrong in my thinking there, but that could be a huge issue for all British clubs.

As for contracts, I hope that you are right with regards to the plus ones, but even then, that is just delaying things by a year, we really should be getting them all signed up on long term deals, it is unbelievably sloppy that we haven't, it just shows poor planning, and a complete lack of care on our behalf towards them.

Would we let Bruno or de Gea's contract run down in such a manner, no, I don't belive that we would, so why should it be any different here??
 

jojojo

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Wasn't Hasegawa signed before Brexit happened or at the very least, the full powers of it coming into force??

I could be wrong in my thinking there, but that could be a huge issue for all British clubs.

As for contracts, I hope that you are right with regards to the plus ones, but even then, that is just delaying things by a year, we really should be getting them all signed up on long term deals, it is unbelievably sloppy that we haven't, it just shows poor planning, and a complete lack of care on our behalf towards them.

Would we let Bruno or de Gea's contract run down in such a manner, no, I don't belive that we would, so why should it be any different here??
Brexit doesn't really affect non-EU nationals like Hasegawa - most of the rules were already there for them. She would have picked up most/all of the points she needed for her work permit from her Japan NT appearances without any time in Europe.

For EU nationals - it does mean that we can't sign U18s at all and younger players in general are difficult. There's no "special talent" type exemption available. For a full international of a top 20 country, currently playing in one of the big leagues - you can usually make the numbers add up, even if they aren't regular starters in the NT.

It's harder for players from lower ranked countries and leagues though. Which means the chances of finding the "hidden gem" or the "up and coming" that much worse. That said, most of the players we see on the TV in the CL or playing in the Euros this summer will qualify.
 

MUW4Eva

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Brexit doesn't really affect non-EU nationals like Hasegawa - most of the rules were already there for them. She would have picked up most/all of the points she needed for her work permit from her Japan NT appearances without any time in Europe.

For EU nationals - it does mean that we can't sign U18s at all and younger players in general are difficult. There's no "special talent" type exemption available. For a full international of a top 20 country, currently playing in one of the big leagues - you can usually make the numbers add up, even if they aren't regular starters in the NT.

It's harder for players from lower ranked countries and leagues though. Which means the chances of finding the "hidden gem" or the "up and coming" that much worse. That said, most of the players we see on the TV in the CL or playing in the Euros this summer will qualify.
Ahh many thanks for this, that is very helpful to understand.
 

ImmortalJoker66

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Keep Batlle, Groenen, and the current signings (plus the loanee) for next season. Give Ladd the Captaincy and Zelem some rest
 

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Need more quality in depth and Skinner needs to start using them instead of using the same players week in week out
 

jojojo

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Need more quality in depth and Skinner needs to start using them instead of using the same players week in week out
His determination to stick with more or less the same starting lineup for weeks, irrespective of last week's team performance or who this week's opponents are, suggested to me that he didn't think much of his squad.

I know injuries have left us wafer thin in some positions - most noticeably at centre back when we had Turner, Mannion, Caldwell and Ladd out simultaneously. But it did bother me that he never really seemed to view Fuso or Boe Risa as a serious option for example - even as early subs.
 

MUW4Eva

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His determination to stick with more or less the same starting lineup for weeks, irrespective of last week's team performance or who this week's opponents are, suggested to me that he didn't think much of his squad.

I know injuries have left us wafer thin in some positions - most noticeably at centre back when we had Turner, Mannion, Caldwell and Ladd out simultaneously. But it did bother me that he never really seemed to view Fuso or Boe Risa as a serious option for example - even as early subs.
What position is Fuso's best, this isn't me being facetious or anything, she has been here now for a while, and I still can't answer that question, is she an out and out striker, a wide attacking forward, a winger, what is she??

She has had so few appearances that it is really hard to know for sure.
It is why I am in the dark over if we should keep her or not, as I have no idea of her potential, if she is close to her maximum, or of there is still more to come from here.
Would we really regret it, if we let her go??
I just don't know.

The lack of rotation is somewhat annoying, yes there is the old adage of "You don't change a winning team", however we didn't win against Villa, and there were no consequences for the players that did play unbelievably poorly in that game, they retained their place.

I would have liked to have seen more of VBR, but I got the sense, it was an either or situation with her and Jackie, I don't think he was looking to play them both together (even if the one time he did away to Chelsea in the cup, Jackie set up VBR to score a goal).

Also, I really don't see or know where Staniforth fits in, she just looks to have been on the sidelines, or not involved for quite a few games.

The same could be said, due to his lack of rotation for a few players, such as Moore as well, he brought her in when she was clearly injured, and then when she has been fit, she hasn't been used, so that was a very strange deal to me.

If he continues to stick with this mindset next season, then I can see a fair few players fast becoming unhappy.
 

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His determination to stick with more or less the same starting lineup for weeks, irrespective of last week's team performance or who this week's opponents are, suggested to me that he didn't think much of his squad.

I know injuries have left us wafer thin in some positions - most noticeably at centre back when we had Turner, Mannion, Caldwell and Ladd out simultaneously. But it did bother me that he never really seemed to view Fuso or Boe Risa as a serious option for example - even as early subs.
true. Hanson seems to be out of favour. Fuso rarely gets more than 10 mins. Hopefully he can bring in reinforcements that he’s willing to trust
 

MUW4Eva

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true. Hanson seems to be out of favour. Fuso rarely gets more than 10 mins. Hopefully he can bring in reinforcements that he’s willing to trust
I don't know what the point of keeping Fuso is, as she is clearly too old for the developmental side, and by the looks of things, she isn't good enough for the first team, so why keep her on next season?

I would let her go personally, if she ends up doing well elsewhere then good on her, but right now, I can't see what she possibly brings to our first team, and what should be a determination to get a top 3 place next season.
 

jojojo

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The Telegraph article on the organisational change at United planned for this summer includes this on the women's team:
"The anticipated appointment of a head of women’s football this summer will further lighten his (Murtough's) load. United conducted interviews with around six candidates after Christmas and are prepared to recruit from other sports ahead of what they expect to be more rapid growth in the women’s game over the next few years."

I don't know what's happened since those interviews, but hopefully something is happening.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/footbal...rets-manchester-uniteds-great-summer-rebuild/
 

MUW4Eva

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They need to hurry up and get on with announcing it, the window is nearly open, and we have a tonne of players whose deals are about to expire.....

No rush or anything......